Many Tears
by xXSavinTheWhalesXx
Summary: Seven years. Many tears. Many fears. How many times can a heart break for one person? A seven-shot of our favourite Granger and her ginger friend. Rated T because because, well, K is for pansycakes.
1. Alone

**Hello, my sexy beasts. This is the first instalment of a seven-shot, featuring one incident in every book when Ron's been an arse to Herman. It was rather random; one moment I was showering, singing at the top of my lungs, next second the water's been shut off and I'm typing like mad because I'd been struck by inspiration. Needless to say**, **I****'ll be** **wiping** **water** **spots** **off** **my** **iPad** **for** **a** **while. **

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Wingardium Leviosa

She sits back down in her desk at the end of the lesson, pleased with herself for having been the first to levitate the feather. She's always been top of the class back home, so she expected nothing less. If anything, if she hadn't shown them all what she was capable of, she suspected that life here at the castle would be miserable. It's lonely enough already, falling asleep behind the heavy scarlet curtain, listening to her dorm mates giggle and whisper about the day. Eating at the end of the long wooden table,hearing mindless chatter between friends and siblings as she props up her book up on the pumpkin juice jug. Sitting in the very front of the class, where she can pretend that it's just her and the teacher and her textbook and that learning really is the most important thing in life. She can't possibly think how much worse it would be if she had terrible marks. Her grades are like her friends. She can fish her newest piece of homework out of her bag when she's feeling especially lonely, late at night or in between classes or at mealtimes, and just stare at that little 100% written in red ink that tells her that she's done well, that she's worth something,that it doesn't matter that she's only staring at a piece of parchment, because that little red mark is a reflection of what someone thought of her work.

She puffs out a little sigh and gather up her things, stuffing them into her bag. She hates the sight of everything misplaced in a jumble inside the fabric depths, but there's plenty of time to organize it in the next class. Standing up rather abruptly, she joins the end of the queue to exit the class, ending up behind that ebony-haired boy, Harry Potter, and his ginger friend Ron Weasley. She finds the pair of them rather unsavoury, with their bouts of rule-breaking; first the flying lesson, then the midnight escapade, then the broomstick. The nighttime outing particularly terrified her; if they had been caught, she would have been expelled, and she can't imagine how disappointed she or her parents would be. Although Harry seems alright for the most part, aside from his disregard for rules, it's his friend that particularly incenses her. He's quite rude to her, which hurts her feelings quite a bit. She always has to bite her tongue to avoid saying inflammatory things around him, because then he would just pick on her more, but somehow her tongue never co-operates. As she ruffles around in her bag to restore some sort of order, following the crowd that's filtering out the door and pushing its way into the crowded corridor, she catches the tail end of their conversation.

"...no wonder she hasn't got any friends. She's a nightmare, honestly."

Her eyes widen, and she's surprised that the surrounding people can't hear the snap of her heart. Her eyes prickle, and her throat burns, and two tears escape from her brimming eyes without her permission. Without pausing for thought, she pushes her way past the pair of them, aiming for the toilets, where she can be left alone.

Alone.

Breaking into a run, she crashes into people going perpendicular to her direction, ignoring their angry yells, until she slams into the door. Pushing the heavy wood back, she slips in as quietly as she can and walks blindly to the last stall, her eyes clouded with tears. Once there, she locks the door and sits down on the closed toilet lid, letting her tears stream down her face. A sob escapes, then another, until she's blubbering and can't stop.

It's not as if she doesn't know that she's friendless. She knows perfectly well, thank you very much. But it's one thing to have that knowledge for yourself and come to terms with it, and entirely another to have someone say it- and not even to her face, but behind her back. And maybe it hurts more because it came from Ronald Weasley, who doesn't seem the type to lie to say nasty things. Which means that he really believed what he said, and that she really is a nightmare. Maybe it hurts more because she honestly tried to make friends with both of them on the train ride to school, but she doesn't really know how to make friends and ruined everything by being a bossy know-it-all and telling him that he had dirt on his nose. Maybe it hurts more because she was only trying to help him do the charm properly, but ended up showing him up. She just wishes that she was more than intelligent. She wishes that she was funny, and kind, and pretty, and had friends. Because even though she tries to tell herself differently, she knows in her heart that she doesn't want to be alone.

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**So, there it is. It's really short, but I'm satisfied with how it turned out, regardless of length. Please R&R&R if you read it, even if you didn't like it, because otherwise I don't know what in hell you thought of it. **

**Happy summer!**

**Aggie**


	2. Hideous

**I'm listening to Granger Danger right now...**

**Thank you for all the favourites and follows, they made my day! And an extra special thanks to my reviewers:**

**emblah01**

**An aggietastic Guest**

**Weasley's Love**

***important A/N at the bottom***

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Polyjuice Potion

As she presses herself to the wall of the stall to allow her two accomplices to pass, clutching the tumbler tightly to her chest, the nagging seeds of doubt and worry that had already burrowed into her mind a month ago begin to sprout and niggle about. No matter how many times she reassures herself that all precautions have been taken, that everything will work out, she can't help seeing Murphy's Law coming into full effect for this escapade, this reckless endeavour to unearth an only slightly plausible circumstance. Regardless, she stares down into the murky, sick-coloured depths of Essence of Millicent Bulstrode churning about beneath her nose, and feels her stomach shift at the thought of ingesting it. She would much rather have the Slug charm placed on her than this; then again, if the look of ghastly discomfort on Ron's face was any indication, this might be less painful. But after seeing those gruesome illustrations of those wizards in such pain throughout the transformation, she begins wishing that she was as brave as Harry, or as "do-first-think-later-consequences-be-damned" as Ron. She's only book-smart, bossy know-it-all Hermione, and that's all she ever will be.

"Ready?" comes Harry's voice from the stall next to her.

"Ready," she responds a little too eagerly, and feels a faint blush tinge her cheeks when she hears Ron answer at the same time. She's bewildered by her reaction, but leaves no room for thought when Harry begins to count. On three, it's like time freezes, and in a moment that feels like quicksand, she thinks wildly, _I'll show him,_ before pinching her nose and dumping the contents of her tumbler down her throat.

Although it merely tastes like overcooked cabbage, it burns on the way down. She doubles over as her stomach starts roiling, the pain as sudden as being hit by a sledge hammer. Then it begins. Dear God, then it _begins._

The sensation spreads outwards to the ends of her toes from her very core, like her skin has turned to hot wax. She opens her eyes for the briefest of moments, which were previously pinched closed, and dread weighs her down as she sees bubbles and welts erupting all over. She feels her limbs beginning to writhe without her permission, and as another bolt of pain cleaves through her, her legs fall from beneath her. She can see Harry and Ron's now gargantuan feet from under the stall, and she's about to ask if both of them are reacting this way when the most unpleasant prickly feeling erupts all over her. She watches in horror as thick black hairs begin the sprout from her skin, feels an excruciating pain at her tailbone and a throb of peculiar elongation. She doesn't understand what's happening to her, but all thought is wiped from her mind when her eyes begin to bubble. She pinches the lids tightly closed, and yet this is more agonizing than the rest. Finally, the sensation abates, and she's left breathing heavily on the bathroom floor. She braces her hands against the stall door and stands shakily, but something feels...off. She runs her hands over herself but feels only the rough hair- fur, she realizes. She sucks in a sharp breath and begins quivering as she reaches down to her lower back and grasps a tail; her tail. She feels tears prickle at the corners of her eyes, and shakes her head vehemently. Nononononononothernothernothernotherwhywhywhywhywh ywhy

She's a cat. Millicent Bulstrode must have a cat, and being the presumptuous little girl that she is, she assumed that it must have been _her_ hair. Really, for someone with such acclaimed intelligence, she had been blinded by her own praise. Hadn't she thought that everything would turn out alright? Had she not omitted to foresee any possible occurrence of this nature, something going wrong with the potion? What is she to do?

She hears a low grunt come from the stall next to hers. "Are you two OK?"

She knows that it's Harry, but it sounds so uncannily like Goyle that she can't help but wonder.

"Yeah," Ron-Crabbe- responds, and it's once she hears Ron's voice that she truly begins to panic. What is she to do? She can hardly go outside like this; not only is it mortifying, but what if they were caught, as they surely would be accompanied by her? What if there's no antidote, and she's stuck like this forever?

She hears two locks scrape back and heavy footsteps, and sinks to the floor, clutching her knees, feeling quite faint.

"This is unbelievable. _Unbelievable_," Ron says, and her heart sinks further.

"We'd better get going," Harry says. "We've still got to find out where the Slytherin common room is, I only hope we can find someone to follow..."

"You don't know how bizarre it is to see Goyle _thinking_," Ron says in an awed voice. Suddenly, it's much closer, and he's banging on her door. She jumps back in surprise and hits her head on the toilet. "C'mon, we need to go..."

Her voice comes out quite higher than normal, but that's to be expected, she supposes. "I-I don't think I'm going to come after all. You go on without me."

"Hermione, we know Millicent Bulstrode's ugly, no one's going to know it's you."

If it's even possible, his words make her feel even worse. Because this-what she's become- isn't ugly. It's hideous. It makes her feel even worse about her bushy hair and slouched back and buck teeth, because now she has a tail and she's covered in fur and her eyes are...she's to afraid to even think about what her eyes look like. Who would ever want to look at her, talk to her, if she's this repugnant? She wonders what Ron will think of her. Harry, she knows, is accepting and won't care, but she feels like Ron is still rude sometimes and at a time like this, when she's feeling so vulnerable, he'll rip her to shreds. She answers without thinking much about it, but to her it sounds more like a plea.

"No- really- I don't think I'll come. You two hurry up, you're wasting time."

"_That_ looks more like Goyle," Ron says to his best friend. "That's how he looks every time a teacher asks him a question."

"Hermione, are you OK?" Harry asks through the door.

"Fine- I'm fine...Go on-"

"We'll meet you back here, all right?"

She hears the door creak open and then their footsteps fading away. "Alright," she whispers as tears leak out of her eyes and catch in the fur on her cheeks. This is possibly the worst she's ever felt in her whole life, and sitting here, on her own, she feels even more hideous than usual.

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**Hello my gorgeous guys and gals! So, on July 4th, I'll be leaving for two weeks with my choir to tour Ireland, Wales and England and compete in the Llangollen Eistedfordd (I'm getting better at saying it). I'm super excited to go (we went to South Africa two years ago). We'll be visiting the Warner Bros studio where they filmed Diagon Alley, and I'm probably getting a wand. I'm thinking of getting the Elder Wand, but Hermione's and McGonagall's also hold a lot of appeal. Anyway, what I really wanted to say before I started waffling was that I won't be updating in that time, and probably not for the first few days after that. I'm trying to update more regularly than with my other story (it's PJO, if anyone here likes that), so hopefully I'll get back into the swing of things fairly quickly. **

**Aggie**


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